The term “container tracking” means the detection and the remote real-time and/or postponed transmission of information related to the container position, in order to be able to determine the route thereof during transport operations and/or its operating state, thus identifying a condition of danger, theft or break-in of the container.
The need to track containers for commercial purposes and/or of safety reasons deriving from possible theft and/or terrorism conditions is known.
For this purpose, electronic surveillance systems comprising satellite positioning apparatuses (such as GPS—Global Positioning System), which are installed on containers or on container transport means, and a remote supervision unit interacting with the satellite positioning apparatuses for continuously determining the position of the transport means, were used.
Furthermore, the above-described satellite positioning apparatuses, when directly installed on containers, are known to be typically powered by electric batteries, because the container does not typically have its own electric supply system.
Therefore, the operating autonomy of the currently known satellite positioning apparatuses is strongly influenced by the depletion time of the electric supply batteries.
This condition is highly penalizing whenever container traceability is required over long lasting transport missions and/or under environmental conditions which limit battery performance, such as, for example, very low environmental temperatures.
The need is therefore felt to optimize the power consumption in systems of the above-described type in order to ensure container traceability for the whole transport time, even in case of long lasting transports.